As Chicago dug out from a record-setting blizzard, the snow was set to yield Monday to a deep freeze and uncertainty about the commute to work, the cost of the cleanup and when many schools would reopen.
The snow that fell from midnight-to-midnight Saturday set a record: 18.6 astounding inches, the most to hit Chicago in one day in more than a century of recordkeeping. And with temperatures expected to go as low as 15 below zero in the outlying areas Monday night, all those mountains of snow could be around for a while.
The foul weather claimed the lives of at least nine people in the metropolitan region, including two exposure victims and others who apparently suffered heart attacks while shoveling snow.
The storm’s cost in Chicago alone was in the millions of dollars and counting, thanks to the more than 500 pieces of equipment, including snowplows, bulldozers and 250 spreaders, dipping into the city’s stash of 300,000 tons of salt.
And more challenges were in store Monday as the region faces the first workday commute since the storm. Metra trains were supposed to run on schedule, but Chicago Transit Authority officials told users to expect some delays.
The Chicago Public Schools, Catholic schools in Chicago and several private schools in the city and suburbs were to be closed Monday. Many suburban schools were to be closed as well.
Garbage won’t be picked up Monday in the city so that crews can continue clearing streets.
As snow trailed off early Sunday, the monster storm started to ease its grip on the city and suburbs, leaving most major roads such as Lake Shore Drive cleared but many side streets and alleys clogged.
The sound of snow blowers echoed along city sidewalks and suburban driveways as residents from Lake County to the south suburbs mostly endured the experience with good humor–sledding, shoveling or swan-diving into snowdrifts.
But the storm wasn’t about to disappear easily. Many people had cars cloistered in garages because frozen snow hadn’t been cleared from alleys. And stature didn’t seem to matter.
Riverside Village President Paul Stack struggled to open a gap in his 160-foot-long driveway with a snow shovel, hoping to flag down any passing privately owned plow to rescue his car.
The western suburb has a fleet of three trucks with plows that had worked through the night. But Stack did not plan to ask them to do his driveway.
“That isn’t the way Riverside operates,” he said with a smile.
In Chicago, public school officials had hoped to keep schools open, in part to provide the 350,000 meals a day they serve to students. But school officials were more concerned that with many sidewalks impassable, they didn’t want students tromping along streets.
“The prudent thing to do is to keep the children at home,” said schools chief Paul Vallas, though he added that the custodial staff would have to show up to start the cleanup. Public school buildings will remain open in case some families don’t realize that there are no classes.
“This does not mean that if you cannot get baby-sitting service that you should send your children to school,” Vallas said, adding that officials would wait until Monday to decide whether classes will resume on Tuesday.
The weather should be better by then.
The wind that made the snow fall horizontally on Saturday was supposed to largely die out by Sunday night. On Monday, highs of 5 to 10 degrees were forecast, with lows of 5 below downtown and as cold as 15 below zero in the collar counties.
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Tuesday is supposed to be warmer, with highs from 15 to 20 degrees.
The one-day record of 18.6 inches that fell on Saturday put it well ahead of the previous mark of 16.5 inches, which fell during the Blizzard of ’79. But that is not close to the overall accumulation records. In 1979, the initial onslaught was followed by more than a week of steady snow that left 34.4 inches in 10 days.
In a two-day period in January of 1967, 23 inches of snow fell. The Blizzard of ’99 came close to that mark–piling up 21.6 inches.
That fueled snowball fights among children, who waded in snow past their hips and generally reveled against the schooping sound of shovels. In many areas where people deposited snow away from their front walks, cars and streets, spontaneous games of king-of-the-hill broke out among the neighborhood kids.
People stood atop snow piles as high as stop signs and posed for pictures or just took a look down their street from an angle not usually available.
Marge Marcheschi and her 34-year-old daughter, Cherise, stopped procrastinating and started shoveling the driveway of their Riverside home Sunday.
“We were tired of living bound up in the house,” Marge Marcheschi said.
“We were going to kill each other,” Cherise added.
Tom McLain, 38, of Berwyn talked a friend with a rental store into opening the store long enough Sunday to sell him a snow blower.
Not only did McLain blow his own driveway, but he started up the alley, one-by-one releasing neighbors whose cars had been held hostage to drifts of snow. Then he turned his attention to a mound of snow next to his car.
“That’s my other car, buried up to the roof,” he said.
In DuPage County, the Hinsdale Public Library closed when melted snow leaked through the roof and caused ceiling tiles to drop. Workers were trying to repair damage in time to open Monday morning.
Jack Hurwitz, library director, arrived Sunday morning to open and found a mess from the snow. “It’s caused not only a mess, but a dangerous situation,” he said.
Sheriff’s offices in DuPage and Kane Counties reported no traffic fatalities.
From the Jefferson Park “L” station, American Airlines pilot Dave Pakiz watched cars whiz by on a plowed and salted Kennedy Expressway Sunday morning. “No city in the world is more prepared for snow than Chicago,” he said.
Still, he was expecting a mad scene at O’Hare as the passengers, including those stranded from earlier flights, and airline employee crews competed for limited space on outgoing flights.
At City Hall, Mayor Richard Daley had advice for Chicagoans as the week begins. He urged business owners to clear their parking lots and sidewalks. He encouraged residents to take public transportation to work, to expect delays on buses and trains, and to help each other cope.
City officials refused to guess when the smaller streets will be clear. “I could never predict,” said Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Eileen Carey. “We’re in there. We’ll stay in there.”
At Millen’s Ace Hardware, on Wilmette Avenue in that north suburb, snow meant business and plenty of it. The store was out of standard snow shovels, and the more awkward push shovels were going fast.
“That’s what happens when you wait until the last minute,” said Kenilworth resident Kris Haynes. “We’re snowed in, and it helps when two of you are trying to dig out. . . . It’s been so long since we had to (shovel). Bundle up and enjoy it. It’s winter in Chicago. It’s what it’s supposed to be, right? We’ve been spoiled.”
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MORE ON THE INTERNET: Get updates on closings and a look at Chicago’s past blizzards at: chicagotribune.com/go/snowstorm
SNOWFALL IN CHICAGO.
The Blizzard of ’99 dumped a total of 21.6 inces of snow at O’Hare International Airport from midnight Friday to early Sunday, coming a close second to the 23-inches record set in 1967 in Chicago and shattering the previous single-day record.
Record Chicago snowfalls in number of inches:
Chicago’s top 10 single-day snowfalls
1. Jan. 2, 1999 18.6
2. Jan. 13, 1979 16.5
3. Jan. 26, 1967 16.4
4. Jan. 30, 1939 14.9
5. Jan. 16, 1918 14.4
6. March 25, 1930 13.6
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7. March 2, 1954 11.5
8. Feb. 18, 1908 11.5
9. Feb. 28, 1900 11.3
10. Dec 12, 1903 11.3
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Note: Single-day snowfall totals are measured from midnight to midnight.
Sources: National Weather Service, WGN.
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